There are two types of thinking errors, according to American Sceptic Michael Shermer:
Wed, 26. May 2010
You Believe in What?!?! (Part 3)
1. A 'Type 1 Error' is believing a falsehood.
Those who believe in spoon-bending, alien abductions, homeopathy or lucky charms are committing 'Type 1 Errors' in thinking: they are believing a falsehood. They are misinformed and their thinking has gone wrong. They may believe the world is going to end in 2012 because they are prone to believing misinformation. A 'Type 1 Error' is a gullibility error.
2. A 'Type 2 Error' is rejecting a truth.
This type of thinking error goes beyond gullibility. Ignorance is one thing but ignoring the facts is another. Creationists, flat-earthers, clairvoyants and astrologers are good examples. They not only believe false information but also promote it, despite strong facts to the contrary.
Religion relies heavily on 'Type 2 Errors' of rejecting inconvenient truths. It's existence is based on false assumptions for believing in god (or heaven or angels or whatever) despite very strong evidence against them:
- that Earth is 4.5 billion years old (not 10,000 years);
- that Earth evolved (and was not spontaneously created);
- that humans evolved from other species over millions of years (and were not spontaneously 'created');
- that there is insufficient water on the planet to create the 'great flood' which covered mountains;
- that virgin birth was impossible two thousand years ago;
- that a star cannot hover over a building;
- that post-mortem survival is impossible now and was impossible then;
- that 'blessing' or 'consecrating' water or any other substance has no effect on it;
- that the bible was written by primitive people (not by a deity);
- that prayer does not work;
- that occurences previously attributed to god are in fact natural events;
- that human beings are an insignificant part of a Universe unimaginably huge to the biblical authors;
- that religious leaders wearing silly hats are not infallible;
- that religion is always proven wrong in disputes with science;
- that faith 'healing' always fails;
- that the Universe behaves exactly as a godless universe would be expected to behave; and
- that priests, nuns, brothers, bishops, cardinals and popes can lie and be brutally criminal too.
Yet despite the facts, people still believe in nonesense. I would go one further than Mr. Shermer and add a 'Type 3 Error', which is even more serious than 'Type 2'.
3. A 'Type 3 Error' is the active promotion of untruths.
This type of error of thinking dictates that it is ok to agressively promote fairy tales as the truth; and ruthlessly indoctrinate young children to believe false assumptions and irrationally deny facts.